


Aristotle and Dante Discover the Twenty First Century

by Underdog1103



Category: Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe - Benjamin Alire Sáenz
Genre: Agender Character, Asexual Character, Fluff, Gay Characters, LGBT, LGBTQ Character of Color, M/M, modern day AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-06-21
Updated: 2016-01-17
Packaged: 2018-04-05 12:48:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 5,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4180425
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Underdog1103/pseuds/Underdog1103
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aristotle and Dante join the LGBTQ+ community in the twenty first century.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Swim Team

I didn't necessarily hate school. I tolerated it. And I didn't necessarily hate people. I tolerated them, too. I tolerated almost everything. It's what fifteen year olds do. 

I had a theory that fifteen year olds aren't actually people. People enjoy things. People are passionate about things. Fifteen year olds just tolerate things. 

I tolerated being fifteen. 

I also tolerated my parents. I loved them, but I hated their secrets. The two evened each other out well enough. 

"You should go out and do something," my mom pushed. Summer had ended and on the second day of my sophomore year, my mom had decided for me that I was to join a school related activity. 

One suggestion had been baseball, to which I replied, "I may have a Mexican last name, but because of your overprotectiveness, I never got to play ally ball with the gangs. Can't do that." 

Apparently that wasn't funny. 

Suggestion number two was the swim team. I would never admit to her that I still hadn't taught myself how to swim. I had taught myself how to not drown, but that was much different from swimming. 

My suggestion was starting a dog walking club. We both laughed. I didn't have a dog. 

It seemed that I was stuck joining the swim team. 

I didn't know the first thing about swimming, nor did I understand the logic behind it. I didn't understand why someone would fight the human impulse to breath. Maybe I'd swim the one that just involved lying on your back. 

Another thing on the list of things I tolerated: the locker room. I hated the boys locker room, and with swimming it was the worst. With swimming you didn't even get to keep any part of your clothes on and guys just walked around in the smallest speedos as if everyone wanted to see. 

Then they would go hit on the unlucky girls who still remained on deck from sixth period gym class and inevitably say something stupid. I always wanted to go apologize on behalf of the male population, but it never seemed like it would do much good. Most of the time it didn't even seem like I belonged to the male population. Maybe they should be apologizing to me. 

I stalled outside of the boys locker room. Maybe I could just pretend that they didn't have any room for me or that I came to late in the season or something when my mom would inevitably asked about my day. That's what I'd do. I had almost made it a few steps before hearing a voice behind me. 

"Do you want to try out for the swim team?" 

A scrawny boy, not noticeably taller or shorter than me, asked. He sounded congested, like he had too much chlorine up his nose. 

I didn't respond. I didn't know what to say. 

"I can teach you if you want. Outside of swim practice." I didn't know how he knew I couldn't swim, but he just seemed to be one of those guys who knew about everything. 

I shrugged. I had to do something. 

"Fine. What time does practice end?"

He smiled. It was a nice smile. One that looked like it did more than tolerate something. A real person smile.

"Four thirty. I'm Dante by the way." 

This made me laugh, which made him lose his smile. "Yeah I know, it's a dumb name."

"No, no," I continued to laugh. "My name is Aristotle." I hadn't ever liked it much, but I liked that I was now tied for the worst name in this acquaintanceship. 

He cocked his head. His hair flopping to the side. "Seriously?" 

I nodded, holding my hand out for a handshake. "Seriously. People call me Ari, though." He skipped the handshake and pulled me into one of those half hugs. 

"Nice to meet you, Ari," he said, still smiling. I had never seen anyone smile for so long and still look genuine while doing it. 

We agreed on meeting back at four thirty when practice ended, but I didn't tell him I'd change ten minutes before then so I could be alone in the locker room. If Dante had a thought like that, he'd probably tell me. 

"Oh, and Ari," he called down the hall. I liked the way he said my name. He articulated it like someone would do when a word meant something. No one ever said my name like that. 

I stopped and waited for what he was going to say. Instead, he just smiled and shrugged. "I'll see you later." 

 

The problem with the plan we had created that I should have probably foreseen was that now I had to wait an hour and a half until I could do something. 

I sat on the bench outside, which made me look like my parents had forgotten me. There were a few other stragglers, but they all just stood texting or playing on their phones. I had a phone, but it didn't get much use. I didn't really have any friends to text, and I had never found games fun. Most of the time it just sat in my pocket and I'd get updates from my mom or the two girls I tolerated most in the school, Gina and Susie, would invite me to some party. I usually just ignored their messages. 

The only other thing I used my phone for was music, which I didn't really think counted as using a phone. I put my headphones in and hit shuffle. Most of my music could be considered classic rock at this point, but it was better than that pop stuff that droned endlessly on the radio. La Bamba played through the tiny speakers. It was a good song, so I left it playing. 

In twenty minutes, all of the forgotten kids had either been remembered or decided it was best to start walking home. I was alone in front of the school, which meant I'd probably be alone inside the school, too. 

I walked back inside, my headphones still in my ears. Everyone had left besides the clubs that practiced behind closed doors or the sports teams in their respective locations. But to my eyes, I was the last boy in the school. 

I wandered for twenty more minutes before deciding to head over to the locker rooms. As I had planned, I was still alone. That made changing much easier. 

I did put on the speedo my mom had bought, but I also put on a pair of lose shorts over it that I had bought for myself. They at least covered me somewhat despite the fact they were shorter than short and weighed less than any material I had ever felt. 

I walked onto the pool deck as soon as the first boy walked into the locker room. I passed the rest of the team on the way out, but most of them were too occupied in their conversations to notice. 

There was only one boy left in the pool when I got there. He was in the far lane, which either meant he was really bad or really good depending on how everything was set up. Judging by his long, fluid strokes as he cut through the water, I would put money on, "really good." 

He stopped once he reached the wall and looked up. He didn't wear goggles or a swim cap, which made his eyes all red and his hair plaster to his forehead. 

"Ari," he waved me down as if I had any question as to where I was supposed to be. I sat down on the edge, which I could tell he thought was a bit ridiculous, but he didn't mention anything. 

For the next hour Dante taught me how to swim. I hadn't realized how much touching would be involved. He would tug on my arms to put them in the right direction and hold my ankles for a tighter kick. Had I known there was going to be all the touching, I probably wouldn't have decided to learn. 

Dante was also a patient teacher. He'd correct me every time I took a breath too often or forgot to kick, which happened more than I would like to admit. 

The only way I knew that an hour had passed was my tiredness. I flopped down on the grated deck and groaned. Dante told me I could join the team tomorrow. I told him I'd much rather just be taught by him. I suggested that we could meet before school, but Dante refused. He took an online class first hour just so he could sleep in. We decided we'd just keep it after swim practice three days a week. That'd satisfy my mother well enough. 

After we changed, and Dante attempted to talk to me about some classes that we apparently shared to no avail until I was dressed, we exchanged phone numbers. That meant I officially had five numbers in my phone. Not that I expected to use his anymore than I used the others. 

We both walked home, the same way almost until Dante pointed to a small cul-de-sac off the main road. He invited me to meet his parents, but I made a lame excuse and carried on down the way. It took ten more minutes to get to my little ranch a left then a right off of the main road. 

My mom asked how school went. I told her I joined the swim team. I didn't tell her about Dante though. I wanted Dante to be a secret for a bit longer.


	2. Texting

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Ari realizes that he doesn't only tolerate texting.

Dante Q: I had fun 2day

Ari M: me too. 

Dante Q: ur a bettr swimmr than u think

Ari M: probably not. 

Dante Q: do u ever wondr if dogs r aware of how many diff breeds there r? Do u think they can communic8 w/ other breeds? R there accents? R there dog social classes?

Ari M: No. 

Dante Q: no you don't think about it or no to the differentiating breed things? 

Ari M: both. 

Dante Q: that means u have thought about it

Ari M: only because you brought it up. Why do you text like that?

Dante Q: my dads an English prof. He hates it. 

Ari M: you don't like your dad?

Dante Q: no, I'm crazy about my parents. It just makes my dad not want to read my texts. I'll stop. 

Ari M: you're crazy about your parents?

Dante Q: yeah. They're great. It's an unpopular opinion. 

Ari M: hm. 

Dante Q: it's okay to have a conversation with someone, Ari. 

Ari M: I know. 

Dante Q: what do you want to be when you grow up?

Ari M: I'm not going to grow up. 

Dante Q: I'm serious. 

Ari M: I don't know. You?

Dante Q: I'm going to be an artist. 

Ari M: seriously?

Dante Q: seriously. 

Ari M: seriously. 

Dante Q: you're inscrutable, Aristotle Mendoza. 

Dante Q: why haven't I ever seen you around school? 

Ari M: I don't know. I haven't seen you either. But I think we have English together. Mrs. Petra, forth hour?

Dante Q: guess so. Have you read The Sun Also Rises yet?

Ari M: fuck no. It's too long. You?

Dante Q: do you kiss your mother with that mouth? And I read it last year. 

Ari M: no. And overachiever. 

Dante Q: do you want to read it together?

Ari M: sure

Dante Q: OK, I'll come over tomorrow after practice and read it to you.

Ari M: okay. 

Dante Q: see you tomorrow, Ari Mendoza 

Ari M: see you tomorrow, Dante Quintana


	3. Ari's house

I waited for Dante after his swim practice. I told him we had to pretend I was on the team, so I was going to stay after every day anyway. He told me that was lying. 

Dante walked right next to me, kicking his legs out and letting his arms swing. He was going to be tall, much taller than me. I had stopped growing in eight grade, which luckily I was really tall back then. But Dante didn't look like he had grown into his extremities yet. Long legs, long arms, his torso would probably grow in time. 

We talked about everything but school, which was different than any conversation I had with other kids. They always wanted to recap everything that happened throughout the day, as if school wasn't bad enough the first time around. 

Instead, we talked about birds and dogs swimming and art. I didn't know much about any of those topics, but Dante did most of the talking anyway. I just liked listening to him talk. Sometimes his voice would accidentally squeak or crack, and I'd try not to laugh. He claimed it was allergies, and I didn't know much about being a guy, but I did know that it wasn't because of the air. 

The walk usually took me thirteen minutes to get home, that afternoon with Dante it took twenty five. It didn't seem like it took any longer than usual, but time was weird like that. It went slower when you wanted it to go faster and faster when you weren't paying attention, and sometimes it just stopped all together. Being with Dante made time do all sorts of weird things. 

"Hey, Sweetie!" My mom called from in the kitchen. My dad didn't say anything, but I knew he was home. I had some sort of sensor that went off every time he was in a half a radius from me. 

She came out of the kitchen surrounded by a fog and the smell of sautéed peppers. "This is Dante." I made a vague hand gesture to the boy on my left and gave her the opportunity to make up what she thought we were. Of course she'd smile once he left and would say, "What a nice friend."

I didn't know if Dante and I were friends yet. I had never had a friend, so the requirements of being one were still lost on me. I had Gina and Susie, but I didn't think that they counted. I had known Gina since first grade and Susie was Gina's friend, but we didn't hang out outside of school and I didn't answer their texts and I couldn't even remember what Gina's natural hair color was, so I didn't think that qualified us as friends. 

Dante didn't seem to mind my vague introduction. He had already followed mom into the kitchen to see what she was cooking. Swimmers loved food. Dante was no exception. 

Mom had him eating out of the pan by the time I followed them in, dad was sitting in front of the television. An infomercial played. He never watched anything real on TV, I think he just liked the noise. 

Dante introduced himself from my dad and complimented him on his UPS uniform. He said that his packages have always been delivered on time and how nice it must be having such a respectable job. Coming from anyone else it would sound like utter bull, but Dante made it sound sincere, like one day he too could be privileged enough to be a delivery guy. 

Maybe he would in his spare time while he tried to become an artist. I didn't know anything about Dante. He was a secret in a house full of secrets in a world full of secrets that I couldn't understand. Dante understood them though. It's what Dante did. 

"We're going to work on our English now," I excused Dante and I to go up to my room. Mom sent Dante up with a snack plate and promised him dinner. 

He stopped on the way down the hall. 

"Who are all these people?" 

He meant the wall of forty eyes staring back at him. I tried to avoid that wall as best as I could. There was pair of eyes that weren't up there who should be and all of the other eyes knew it. They smugly looked down at me and taunted, "We know where your brother is. He's in prison. Nobody gets pictures when they're in prison. Don't be next." 

"My sisters, they're twins twelve years older than me. Together they've got like eight kids. Technically they're my nieces and nephews, but they don't call me uncle." Not that I was bitter about that. "That's my aunt and her wife. Franny, her wife, she died a while back. They didn't have kids. Those are my mom's other siblings, they haven't talked to my aunt since she married Franny. Those are my dads war buddies. He doesn't talk about them. Ever."

Dante nodded, smiling at each picture like he was personally greeting everyone. And then he switched the pictures around so my aunt and her wife were in the middle of all my mom's other siblings. My aunt looked happier. 

Dante was the kind of person who walked into someone's house, ate their food, and then rearranged their pictures. That was one secret about Dante, but it opened up so many more questions. 

"Ready to read?" He pulled out the copy of his English book and gestured for me to lead the way to my room. 

He sat down in my rocking chair and I flopped onto my bed. I grabbed my book and began to read silently. I didn't really expect him to read out loud. But then Dante's voice interjected my reading with words I had already read. They sounded different when Dante read them. Deliberate. Words never sounded that way when I said them. I let him read as I listened. Not so much to the story, I listened, but to they sound of his voice. Getting out of the pool and out of the outside air did something to it. It was smooth and clear and like poetry had come off the page and through his vocal chords. 

He must have stopped reading at some point, but he didn't stop talking. It took me a moment to realize that he had told me something about the real world. Well, my world, which didn't always feel real, but it was close enough. 

"Your room is like modern art," he said. 

I scrunched my eyebrows together. 

"It's clean and it's simple and it's missing something." 

I thought about that for a moment. I didn't like how honest he was. 

"Your whole house is like modern art." 

Maybe because my whole house was missing my brother, Bernardo, who was in prison. Or my father, who was still in Vietnam. Or me, who existed somewhere between my parents world and my own. Or a dog. Every house needed a dog. 

Someday I'd get a dog. Someday.


	4. 6 Month Summary

The next day I broke my legs and my arm and probably had a concussion but I was unconscious so my head wasn't really doing the hurting and then Dante left.


	5. The Walk in the Rain

I've been informed that although my rule is to never talk about what the accident was, that's not proper story telling. So I will break my rule and write. It's not like I haven't broken my other rules, too. 

Dante had given me another swim lesson, which he had decided we're ridiculous because I either laid on the side of the pool and complained or was actually a decent swimmer. 

We changed, which I had gotten better at. I could now hold small talk with my back completely turned to Dante. I think he caught on to my discomfort, so we talked about the weather and the fact that for living in the desert, it sure did rain a lot. We both decided we liked the rain. Because I was half naked, I failed to tell him that, "No, I /really/ liked the rain."

We were walking home, and the sun was already starting to set earlier than it had in the summer, and, sure enough, it was raining. We were both already wet from swimming and we were boys. Everyone joked about how boys liked to play in the rain, but I didn't see how that was a boy related activity. 

Besides the reason I had to wear a speedo, maybe playing in the rain was the only reason I was a boy. So I walked even slower, jumping in puddles and trying to splash Dante. He didn't try to splash back. He'd been weird ever since swim, like somehow I had become Dante for the day and he had become Ari. 

I liked to think I felt like Dante on the inside. Maybe Dante felt like Ari on the inside. That was a sad thought. 

"I'm leaving," he said. It was abrupt and sudden and it sounded like he had replayed it so much in his head that it had gone past the stages of meaning and into meaningless. I never thought I would hear a meaningless word come out of Dante. 

Well, those words weren't meaningless to me, but they sounded meaningless to him. I didn't realize Dante and I were friends until he told me I was about to lose him. 

"I'm leaving, Ari. For the rest of the school year. I leave in a month. A professor in Chicago died and they need my dad to fill in for him. It's good money so we have to leave." He kept saying the word leave as if I hadn't heard it the first time. I wanted him to stop. 

He already answered all the questions I could ask, so he left me with nothing to say at all. 

He looked everywhere but me. We both wanted to say something but we didn't know the words. It was like that song that sometimes gets stuck in your head and you can only hum the melody but you need to sing the words to get it unstuck. That's how it always felt with Dante. 

"There's a dog." I highly doubted those were the words he wanted to say. His bare feet slapped the pavement, splashing in the potholes that had collected the rain. I hadn't looked up, I was only focused on Dante and his lack of shoes. 

Then I heard a car horn. 

Then I heard my own voice yelling Dante's name. 

Then I woke up in the hospital.


	6. Legs for Ari

The first thing I noticed was the pain. Everywhere. Excruciating pain. 

The second thing I noticed was the tears. They weren't my own, but my mother's. I hated crying. There should have been a rule about crying. 

"Stop crying," I thought I said. There was a ringing in my ears that made me question my own voice. 

"You were in a coma," she sobbed into my father's shoulder. 

I couldn't keep my eyelids open any longer. I went back to sleep. 

 

When I woke up again my mother was gone and Dante had taken her place. 

He was crying, too. There definitely needed to be a rule about that. 

"Stop crying," I said again. This time I knew I said it out loud. 

He looked up at me through red eyes. His arm was broken. A dog sat by his side. The same damn dog that he was standing in the middle of the road for. How did I get the two broken legs if he was the one in the road?

"You saved my life, asshole," he laughed. 

I laughed, too. It hurt, but it felt good. I didn't know how I could have such contradicting feelings, but with Dante everything was more complicated. 

"You saved the dog." I was glad the dog was okay. At least someone in this room wasn't broken. 

"They said I could keep her." 

"So what, you keep her and then I keep you?" I don't know why I said that. We both laughed. I didn't know if it was a joke. 

He made a clicking noise with his tongue and the dog stood up, and walked over to me. She dug her nose under my hand and let it rest on her nose. She was a good dog. 

"Mom and dad won't let me keep her in Chicago. So she's yours. Not out of pity or gratitude like I assume you hate, but because I can't have her." 

I wanted to say thank you. Those would have been the appropriate words, but they would mean that I either accepted his pity or recognized that he was grateful and I couldn't do either of those. So I just said, "You know what happens when you assume things." 

He raised an eyebrow at me. "Am I wrong?" 

He wasn't. 

"What are you going to name her?"

I thought for a while. I thought about the modern art comment and how my legs in casts kind of looked like modern art. I was definitely missing something. 

"Legs," I smiled. She licked my hand. "I'll call her Legs."


	7. Table Scraps and Good Raps

Dante had a great reading voice. He knew I didn't like talking too much, and he didn't like silence. We compromised. 

But soon we finished the book for school. I told Dante it was okay, but I really did enjoy it. I liked reading about the war, it made me think that I could see the way my father saw the world. But I don't think anyone could know how my father saw the world. 

Once we finished the book, I thought Dante wouldn't come back. He couldn't swim, his arm was still broken. We were stuck together. 

The next day Dante brought Legs with him and the doctors said it would be okay for her to jump on the bed. She curled up next to my good arm and rolled over for me to rub her tummy. 

"Have you ever had a pet before?" Dante asked, sitting next to me and petting Legs. I didn't like conversation, but I hated the itch underneath my casts more. I needed a distraction. 

I shook my head. "I had a fish when I was real young, but it kept dying," I shrugged. Then I realized that didn't make me sound like a great pet owner for Legs. "But I was, like, two and it was probably because we didn't have any fish food and we tried to feed it table scraps." 

I didn't know why I was trying to defend myself to Dante. But it was nice seeing him laugh. Nobody laughed around me anymore. It was like they thought broken legs meant I couldn't laugh. My legs weren't the reason I didn't laugh, but I didn't tell people that. 

"I think dogs can live on table scraps. Fish, probably not." He laughed some more which made me laugh. We always laughed when we were together. I didn't know why. I didn't tell him that I liked it. 

He looked down at my casts, still laughing. "I broke my arm trying to save a dog. You broke yourself trying to save me. Our mothers raised too good of boys."

"We're not too good," I said. 

"Have you ever drank?"

"No. Not yet. I want to, though." 

"Smoked?"

"No."

"Done drugs?"

"Had sex?"

"Not yet. I want to, though." That didn't feel like the truth, but it felt like the boy thing to say. 

"They raised good boys," he laughed, placing a kiss on Legs. 

Maybe that was somewhat true.


	8. Home-- Sort Of

Dante got his cast off the day the doctors told me I could go home. Except I'd be going home in a wheel chair and full leg casts and he'd only have a sling. 

I was excited to go home, of course, but what was different there than in the hospital? Instead of nurses waiting on me, it'd be my parents at wits end. That was the only difference. 

I wanted to pretend I'd be happier at home. I wanted to pretend that I'd be happy to see Dante. Hell, I wanted to pretend I'd be happy. But I didn't want to go back to a house with a mom who cared too much and a dad who still hasn't come back himself. I didn't want to see Dante and his sling because it reminded me that I jumped in front of a car for him for reasons I couldn't justify.

Mom wheeled me in through the front door on a Tuesday morning. Dante had texted me but I didn't read it, or the next five. Dad moved the red lounging chair so I could park myself in front of the tv like true Americans did. 

I had never hated anything in my life. But in those first five minutes, I knew I hated television. I had watched it before- dad always had something on during dinner- but I never cared. This was the first time I had eve sat in front of the television with no ulterior motive and it was horrible.

I tried to roll away with my one good arm, but that only resulted in making a giant circle and bumping into the coffee table with my extended leg. 

"You can't do that," my mother said. 

"Yeah, yeah, I can't do a lot of things," I huffed back. 

"Tell me what you need, dear," she said, drying her hands with a dish towel. Sometimes I felt like a dish towel. 

"A good book," I said. 

"Don't we all," my dad said from somewhere across the ocean. 

Mom brought me the first thing she could find- Ceremony.  A book about a half white, half Native American boy coming back from war- only to find the true war is in himself. When the first page started off with a poem, I put the book down. "Did you get this from Dante or dad?" I asked jokingly. 

"Dante," mom replied. I didn't like that I had guessed right. 

My phone vibrated on the table again. I knew it was Dante. Nobody else texted me. 

Dante Q: Hows Legs? 

Ari M: Settling in nicely. Mine; however, itch like nobody's business.

Dante Q: I'm sorry

Ari M: you're not allowed to be. 

Dante Q: can I come over after school tmrw? I want to see you again before I leave. 

Ari M: no crying and no apologizing 

Dante Q: no promises


End file.
